Geek Debbie and I managed to squeeze in a whizz of a visit on Saturday to the 2013 Pick Me Up show at Somerset House. As usual you can expect to see striking innovative designs combined with beautifully executed cheeky humour, bold, elegant sketched and stamped.

How was this year any different? In our opion this year was illustration heavy and lacked the more traditional graphic design examples. But then this is probably quite a fair reflection of the times? Craft and illustration have made themselves quite at home in the Graphic Design scene, embedded within the foundations of the grids, typography and that white space we get a bit soppy over. Not that this is a complaint - it was sheer delight and well worth the visit.

The up-rise in new talent in ‘Pick me up selects’ was something to admire. A selection we noted were the playful doodleesque works of Hattie Stewart and the electric characters from Rob Flowers - balanced out the insane detail and skill from Ugo Gattoni and Stuart Patience. Dreamy wallpaper-like art from You Byun contrasting against the graphic illustrative alphabet from Malika Favre and the quirky illustrations from Daniel Frost and Damien Florébert Cuypers
 

Click here for full details on all Pick Me UP Selects 2013 artists

The a majority of the rest of the show was catered with honourable collaborative showcases from new and established artists. We were treated by collections from Handsome Frank, Nelly Duff (hiding Anthony Burill), SOMA, Unlimited and Zombie Collective to name a few. Click here to see a full list of Collectives and galleries

'It's All Fun & Games Until Someone Gets Hurt'

By The London Police
10.05.13 - 26.05.13 

I absolutely love these guys... They don't show here often, so def' worth checking this exhibition out.
They show real adept illustration skills and can rock a fat marker like no-one's business!!!

http://www.stolenspace.com/section.php?xSec=555

http://ht.ly/k0XDn

What do Apple, Starbucks, Facebook and Innocent Drinks have in common? They all have an in-house design team that has been an integral part of their business success.

This NEW award category is an opportunity to show design agencies that the design work of in-house design teams can often rival that of design agencies. It is a unique chance to prove to businesses and brands that in-house design teams can be a powerful business division and a competitive advantage.

The judging criteria is as follows -

Must show evidence that the in-house design team added value to the project that went beyond pure styling
The execution could rival that of a design agency
Bonus points will be gained for evidence of any internal challenges that were overcome to exceed the company’s expectations of what the in-house design team could deliver

The Judging Panel, and wow, a fantastic judging panel of creatives that demonstrate excellence when it comes to leading in-house design teams, not just in the UK but globally.

Good luck - see link for more info:

http://ht.ly/k0XDn

We are hosting our first online interactive project!

Share, Care, Inspire and Discover
Valentine’s Day project 2013
Donate a heart art for Valentine’s Day and raise awareness for heart diseases

It is easy to take part and is open to EVERYONE! Your heart can be created with anything, digitally or by hand, photos, craft, every-day objects, words – it can even be an image you have found. The important thing is that it is a heart shape.

All images will be collated for our very first online showcase on February 14th 2013.

How to take part:
Simply upload your images online by midnight on February 12th:

facebook.com/geekhearts

Tweet with #geekhearts

Sign up to http://geekhearts.co.uk/ to post on your own wall!

SHARE: This project is open to everyone, any age or ability with the mission to put a smile on faces, raise awareness and share a creative challenge. Be as creative as you like!

CARE: By producing a giant Valentine’s message to the world we can help raise awareness for heart disease. You can find info and support for heart conditions at www.bhf.org
- and specifically pulmonary hypertension (PH) http://www.phassociation.uk.com/

INSPIRE: Everyone is creative in some sort of way – YES YOU ARE!  and your heart art will inspire others – plus you’ll be doing a good deed!

DISCOVER: A heart shape is a familiar symbol and quite simple to create. Encourage creativity by communicating with an image and raise awareness for heart conditions.

In 2011, Rebekah Lock set herself a 365 Creative Mission to produce daily heart art and blog about it. The art had to be based on a heart, created within 24hours and inspired by that day, it’s success has inspired this project.
www.geekheartsaday.wordpress.com

Please share this invitation with your friends and encourage creative well being // powered by www.geekhearts.co.uk

p.s Don’t forget – you are responsible for your submission, Please make sure you credit your heart if it is not created by you (say where you found it!).
 

The Carnaby Book Exchange is a space where you can pick up a book, relax in an armchair and explore the vast expanses of fashion, travel, music, photography, design and history, to name but a few topics. You are able to leave a book that you have read, and in return take one away from the space for free.

Carnaby Book Exchange - more info...

If you've always wondered what rain indoors would be like and got the stamina for upto 3hr queue, check out Barbican's Rain Room - showing til 3rd Mar 2013.

Link to Barbican site

Geek Natalie and I had a day of indulging in creative finds in the Northern Quarter of Manchester this week. We lost ourselves in the Richard Goodall gallery, drooled and dribbled around the fun that is the Afflex Centre - We did a little street art spotting along the way and ooohed and awwwed around the Manchester Craft and Design Centre 

Last night geek Heather and I visited the Sketchbook Tour Project on their 2012 world Tour. You might remember that we both took part last year. The crack is that you sign up online, select a theme and your blank sketchbook arrives in the mail).

Upon entering the striking and shiny-new Canada Water Library, you are directed towards an unassuming atrium sort of room called ‘Culture Space’. Greeted warmly by American accents, smiles and a quiet bustling from readers you are quickly equipped with a library card and introduced to the booking system (this will be the bit where every time a sketchbook is checked out, the artist is notified by email-I know it’s happened to me!).

With 2 books at a time we each ooh and awww our way through a world of creative thoughts, questions and humour that to respond relevant themes. An hour is not long enough! I could have easily spent a good 3-4 hours lost in this heavenly world of sketched, collaged, painted, stuck, cut stories and still not managed to view a fraction of the collection.

Sneak peak at wealth of inspirational variety - cut and stick

It is an amazing achievement to have people from ALL OVER the world contribute to a travelling piece of art. A piece of art that is, in fact, something you can touch, embrace, and even in some sketchbooks draw or write into! The variety, scale of individuality and astonishing love that The Sketchbook Project Tour is made with is quite overwhelming.

Stunning rework of Sketchbook function and process by Tamar Kasparian

Would I recommend a visit? HELL YEAH!
Would I recommend being part of the collection?YEAH - DON’T MISS OUT!

What are you waiting for? Sign up to next year’s project now!

Today is the last day of the London tour (19th Oct 2012) but they are a permanent feature in the New York Library. Totally justifies a trip to The Big Apple!

More About Art House (Sketchbook Project Founders)

Art House is an independent Brooklyn-based company that organizes global, collaborative art projects. Our flagship endeavor is the Sketchbook Project: an evolving library that features more than 18,000 artists' books contributed by creative people from 130+ countries. We also operate the Brooklyn Art Library, our storefront exhibition space in the heart of Williamsburg, as a home for all of our projects. Read more from website

You can also see more of Geek Heathers involvement in other interesting Art House creative projects here
 

For all creative design Geeks, London Design Festival will be back in town from 14-23 Sep. There's heaps going on and it's not just for graphic designers - Lots of free events/workshops (booking required) and including independent galleries/companies showcasing product, interiors, eco-design and much more. Check out the events sections and get your diary filled up! 

Enjoy!

http://www.londondesignfestival.com

Sometimes it’s just easier to draw a quick sketch to communicate my message…actually I do this lots. I doodle when I’m on the phone, that impulsive, unscripted gunk that oozes from my inner-creative being. Doodling does fascinate me…it’s not particularly skilful, and everyone can do it really...yep everyone doodles! 

Carrie Lewis

Martina Scott

(dontaed to wasted art gallery by Geek Debbie)

I’ve always been drawn to illustrative, doodling artists and products (no pun intended-but I’m keeping it in here!). I’ve collected a few find over the years and thought it’d be worth collating into a blog post.

L Filipe dos Santos

(doodled by me on my heart geekheartsaday 365 mission)

I’ll also invite you to scan/photograph your doodles (less effort the better=more points for your sharing!) and upload to my wasted art campaign gallery on our geekadoodledo page.
 

A few doodle related links:

http://www.deardoodlediary.com/

google doodles

http://ilovedoodle.com/

I'm not impressed with all of that wordcloud nonsense, but this sort of stuff just blows me away. The patience, precision just oozes elegance to me…what do you think?

I'm certainly dribbling anyway - thanks to the wonder that is Charis Tsevis...

http://www.tsevis.com/

Celebrating that geekhearts now has 20 geeks in the famo, I'm sharing a superdooper 20x design projects created by Jason Munn. I love his work because of his beautufl, simple-but--ohso-clever approach and well-executed designs. This project is a bit old now, but one of my faves and also well-related to the current 30 days of creativity that a few geeks are taking part in...

Article about the Insound 20 project here

More from Jason Munn here

It’s impossible to avoid the Olympics now, I mainly give a passing nod or a grunt when reading an opinionated article slating the Wolff Olins logo creation.

I’m comforted by the fact that like most flippant creatives, I change my mind like the weather – and I can like and dislike designs from one day to the next, fall-in and out of love with artistic styles again and again...but I’m really struggling to be persuaded into really enjoying our 2012 London Olympics logo. Even more so when I look back with envy at well executed and clever Olympic designs from the past.

So what do you think of our London Olympics 2012 logo?
What is your faviourite Olympics logo/identity and have you got any cool olympic related art to share?

I'll share my choices and some of my Olympic eye-candy finds...

First place - Mexico 1978 (designed by Lance Wyman):

Second - Montreal 1976 (designed by designed by Georges Huel and Pierre-Yves Pelletier)

Close Third - Munich 1972 (designed by Otl Aichher):

CR has a fab article discussion of the handful of classic designs in comparison to the 2012 Olypics logo here and I stumbled on a few intresting articles and images too:

CR Olympic Pictograms

 CR Olympic Movement posters

 David Airey

Olympic poster (that I do like!)

Other interesting related imagery:

(btw if you didn't know I'm a ridulous Helovon fan, artist responsible for 2012 paraolympics posters)

Designing tattoos was my first calling, I must have been about 13 when I started buying tattoo mags and copying styles. My parents, let us free-spirited-teens decorate our rooms. I painted floor to ceiling designs over my walls and even plastered a few of my friends rooms too (the above is drawn in some sort of sharpie on a friends wall around '98/99).

I'd designed my own tattoo before I was old enough and by the time I was 20, I'd managed to design nine that others had permanently etched into their skin. 

This style has crept into my graphic design and illustration too:

(illustrative club flyer) 

(Graphic Designing @PRP)

A decade on and I'm seriously fighting of the urge not to get mine made bigger and better and more true to the 'me' I am now. I'm also curious as to what's holding me back, I'm not a hasty tattoo bearer but its beenon my mind for a few years now. I can't help wonder if this is what all tattoo wearers experience, or what makes non-tattoo wearer not get one? I am a true lover of tattoo art and all the glory that goes with it. I'll share a few of a my recent finds: 

(dribble!) x

In the last week I have encounted these lovely wallpapers...one in a bathroom and the other in a cafe...but can you guess which is where?...

Our newest member @MonkeyvsRobots has inspired me to share some of my photos of favourite street art finds over the years...I encourage you to do the same! Please post your graffiti finds and share weblinks etc! Its so hard to choose them - but here's a select few...

Rotterdam street art van

Amsterdam (Jordaan) 

MuTATE event, Portobello Market, London

MuTATE event, Portobello Market, London

- see more photos from both of these events on my website www.arell.co.uk

I was recently shared a phenonemonal discovery by geeks Debbie & Ralph and it easily soaks up all of my admiration for the week...no year...no life!

This is the wonderful concept, design and process undertaken by Nicholas Felton. He creates an annual report of his life EVERY YEAR! With astonishing, inspirational documentation and beautiful graphics - I can't help but be wowed-over: http://feltron.com/